


Try To Redefine

by killingmonsterswritingthings



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Beach Episode, IPRE Days, Multi, Polyamory, Polyamory Negotiations
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-14
Updated: 2017-05-14
Packaged: 2018-10-31 17:37:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10904229
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/killingmonsterswritingthings/pseuds/killingmonsterswritingthings
Summary: Barry and Lucretia both have huge crushes on Lup - and love triangles are for people who aren't trying to save the universe.





	Try To Redefine

**Author's Note:**

> listen.... i had to

 

Lucretia was stretched out in a chair under the sun shelter Magnus and Barry had put together, reading one of the books they had salvaged from the last plane they had failed to save.

Barry, still wet from his latest swimming lesson with Taako, flopped down in the sand next to her. She didn’t lower her book and didn’t acknowledge his presence. He knew she knew he was there.

“God, she’s so beautiful,” he said, a little breathless. Lucretia looked away from the page she was reading to follow his eyes. He was looking at Lup, of course.

She was building an honest-to-god sandcastle with Magnus and was laughing about the crude tower they had just erected. Lucretia had heard Magnus challenge her to do it without magic earlier, so it was obviously coming out a little crooked.

“She is,” Lucretia said, trying to return to her reading. Then, after a beat of silence: “You’re doing this for her, aren’t you? The swimming. You want to impress her.”

Barry flushed. “Uh… well… not really impress her, because I think that train passed a long time ago, but at least look less like… an idiot?” he finished weakly.

“I get that,” Lucretia said gently. “I have the same impulse. She really is something else.”

“You think we have a chance with her?” Barry asked, rubbing his sandy feet together.

Lucretia hummed noncommittally and then sighed as she finally gave up on reading. “I really don’t know. She’s kind and friendly to everyone, and – even worse – she flirts with everyone.”

“Merle told me to just go for it.”

“No offense to Merle, but I don’t think he’s the authority on such matters,” Lucretia said.

Barry laughed. “Yeah, you’re right.”

“I was content with just being in her company, and admiring her from afar, but lately I’ve been wondering if working up the courage… if I could do that,” Lucretia mused.

“Me too,” Barry said. He was quiet for a minute, then looked at Lucretia again. “You don’t think we’re… rivals, kind of?”

Lucretia raised an eyebrow. “Do you?” Barry just stared at her, and a heartbeat later Lucretia realized she had intimidated him. “No, I don’t think so,” she elaborated. “What’s going to happen will happen, no matter what we do. We do not have a say in the matter who Lup likes, or how _many_ people she likes, so there’s no reason for rivalry between us.”

“Oh,” Barry made. “Yeah, I just… wanted to make sure there wasn’t going to be any hard feelings between us.”

“Don’t worry,” Lucretia said, “I have a feeling she will surprise us once again.”

Because there wasn’t a day that went by without Lup pulling a new stunt that completely stunned Lucretia. She had watched her charm an entire village once – without the use of a spell – and seduce a mer-person on the last inhabited water plane they had been to.

“BAROLD!” Lup shouted from across the beach. “Come help us with this moat!”

“See?” Lucretia said and smiled.

“How could I resist?” Barry mumbled. “Coming!” he shouted back.

Lucretia watched him go before finally returning to her book.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Lup came to Lucretia a few weeks later.

“Hey,” she said. She was chewing something that seemed suspiciously like gum, but Lucretia had no idea where she would have gotten it from. Still, Lup was savvy. Lucretia wouldn’t put magical gum past her.

“Hey,” she answered.

“Barry asked me out,” Lup said proudly, with a wide grin.

“I know,” Lucretia said but opened her notebook anyway.

“Oh?” Lup tilted her head to the side. “I thought I should tell you, with all your book keeping, but since you already know...” She dramatically sank into the sand in front of Lucretia.

Lucretia rolled her eyes and made a note in the book. “We talk to each other, Lup.”

Lup looked up at her and it almost killed her – the way Lup’s dark eyes peered up at her through dark lashes, hinting at the seriousness she wasn’t displaying openly right now. “So Barry said.”

“Ah, he told you,” Lucretia said.

Lup grinned. “See, it goes both ways.”

Lucretia finished her short paragraph about the conversation in the notebook but kept it open. She knew Lup wasn’t done yet. Those dark eyes were still on her and Lup’s hand was too close to her foot – if Lup stretched out her fingers, she would touch it.

Lup broke the silence between them after less than twenty seconds. “I’ve _also_ come to ask you out.”

“Oh,” Lucretia made, and then, trying not to let Lup render her speechless: “Is Barry okay with that?”

“Are you?”

Lucretia’s pen was scratching over the page again. “Give me an answer to my question first and then you can have yours.”

Lup’s hand settled on hers. “Luce, look at me.” Lucretia’s hand stilled and she looked up. She was afraid she would lose herself in Lup’s eyes, but she was doing her best not to. “He knows you’re not into dudes, but you’re good friends, and I like you both, so we thought… why not try? There’s more than one way to do a relationship.”

Her hands itched to record what had been said – what was _being_ said – but her hands were still trapped under Lups’ and despite the urge to write, she couldn’t bring herself to pull them away. “I… yeah… I’ve thought about that,” she admitted.

“And?” Lup asked, a little breathless.

“I… I agree that we could… try.”

Lup rose up again in one fluid motion, bending over Lucretia and pressing a short kiss to her lips. “Excellent,” she grinned. “I’ll go tell Barry.”

Lucretia’s head was spinning. She just managed to pull herself together before Lup took off. “Wait!” Lup turned, her ears twitching, and looked at Lucretia expectantly. Lucretia took a deep breath. “Can I kiss you too?”

She could have sworn that Lup’s smile couldn’t get any wider, but it did right then. “Yes.”

Lucretia stood up from her chair, notebook still tightly clasped in her hand, and took the three steps towards Lup. She carefully touched Lup’s cheek with her free hand, running it up to her ear and into her hair. Then she leaned in and carefully touched her lips to Lup’s.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

It was surprisingly easy. Or maybe Lup just made it easy for them.

Barry had already been a good friend to Lucretia, but this only caused them to grow closer.

They moved their sleeping arrangements in the cabin, which they had all built together beyond the dunes, around so the three of them could sleep next to each other – which, in hindsight, was a terrible idea because they kept each other up a lot, which in turn led to Merle throwing pillows at them and Taako being passive aggressive. But when they actually slept, it was so much better. Lucretia had had a habit of waking early, and Lup usually fell asleep late, but with Barry in-between them they learned to fall asleep easier and wake later.

There were soft touches from Lup, and a lot of teasing about her notebook, and _so much_ food, but Lucretia still didn’t forget what her duty was. She worked together with Barry on the Light a lot – which at this point mostly consisted of them staring at it, willing it to do _anything_ , so they could find out what they could do better, what they could do at _all_.

Lup joined them one afternoon, apparently bored of everything else and gravitating towards them as usual.

“We focus so much on the light,” she said, resting her arm on Lucretia’s shoulder, “but what if we tried actually researching the Hunger.”

“And how would you do that?” Lucretia asked.

“Uh, magic?” Lup asked as if it was obvious. “Like, we know virtually nothing about it. How corporeal are they? What’s their consciousness like? Hivemind? Individuality? If they can eat us, could we eat them?”

Barry snorted so loudly he had to turn away.

Lucretia wanted to bury her face in her hands. “You’re unbelievable.”

“No, I’m just curious.” Lup grinned.

“And right,” Barry added. “If we knew how they work, we could combat them more easily. Maybe even communicate with them, and that would crack this thing wide open. If we knew what they want beyond consuming the light… It would be amazing.”

“I know,” Lucretia said. That was the worst part of it. Lup being right in her goof. “But we can only observe them from afar, like they do with us before the main horde arrives. It’s a stalemate.”

“But what if we got closer?” Lup argued. “The scouts are little in numbers at the beginning. If we can retrieve the light, we should be able to capture one of them.”

“I don’t think they would let us,” Lucretia said drily. It wasn’t that the thought hadn’t crossed her own mind before, it was just that it seemed impossible.

Lup shrugged and turned away. “Whatever. Not the point of this beach holiday anyway, hm? We’re here to relax. The war resumes in the next round.”

Lucretia inhaled, relieved to have avoided the confrontation, but wondered what it had actually been about.

“Come on,” Lup said, taking their hands, “let’s get out into the sun. You’ll go mad if you stare at this thing any longer. Come swimming with me!”

And so she dragged Barry and Lucretia out of contemplation once again.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Letting herself be happy however was strangely hard for Lucretia.

Lup took her and Barry out on a date. There wasn’t a lot to do on this plane, but there was also never a dull moment with Lup. They wandered up the beach, far far away from their camp, climbing over the rocks and cliffs and looking for new kinds of crabs in the shallow pools between them.

Lucretia had been hesitant so far to actually go into the water, content with walking along the shoreline, dipping her toes in and otherwise sitting in the shade and watching as the others braved the waves. But of course Lup couldn’t let that go for long.

“Come on,” she coaxed. “Look, even Barry is swimming.”

“I don’t have to impress you,” Lucretia said drily.

“I heard that!” Barry yelled back, already waist-deep in the water. Lup’s hand on Lucretia’s wrist was insistent and Lucretia let herself be tugged along until the water hit her knees.

Lup smiled at her. “You look so good in the ocean,” she said.

Lucretia rolled her eyes. She didn’t have any illusions about how out of her element she must seem. She was a person of solid ground under her feet, sand between her toes, things to hold onto. Not the ever changing currents of water that could suck you under at the change of a wind.

She dove into the water anyway, to get it over with, and then floated a little, listening to Lup laugh and splash Barry with water. She watched her pull him underwater with her to kiss him and laughed when they came back up for air, Barry spluttering and gasping because he had swallowed water.

But eventually Lup’s hands settled on Lucretia’s waist again and she floated into her space effortlessly, as if the water did her bidding willingly, drawing Lucretia closer. “Tired of us already?”

“Never,” Lucretia replied, smiling. “But my hands are getting pruny.”

Lup laughed. “Let me see.” She raised Lucretia’s hand from the water, water running off it, and inspected it closely. “Nah, don’t think so. You just don’t like swimming.”

“Oh no, you’ve discovered my secret.” Lucretia had to laugh. “It’s alright here because I can see the ground, but I wouldn’t swim any further out.”

“You scientists,” Lup said to them both and sighed dramatically, “scared of the unknown.”

She kicked her legs to push forward and pressed a kiss to Lucretia’s lips before drawing back to look at something next to her in the water.

“Ohhh, that’s a really pretty seashell,” she said. And then she was gone, diving towards the ocean floor.

“She’s amazing,” Barry said, a little breathless from treading water, as they watched her retrieve the shell.

Lucretia couldn’t even look away when Lup emerged from the water, shaking her hair out of her eyes and holding up the shell triumphantly.

“She is,” she agreed.

 

Finally, when the sun began to set and they had all long dried again, Lup spread out a blanket in the sand.

“Stargazing,” she had said and dragged the two of them down with her.

But Lucretia was unable to enjoy it.

She knew what was out there, she knew that the Hunger was lurking just beyond the atmosphere, somewhere behind the horizon. Stars had stopped looking inviting to her, and only reminded her of all-seeing eyes now.

“Relax,” Lup said and Lucretia could feel her hand on her wrist again, tugging her closer. Lucretia didn’t know if she would be able to actually listen to Lup, but she at least edged closer to her girlfriend.

Lup sneaked an arm around her and Lucretia put her head on her chest.

“There’s not just bad things out there,” Lup said.

“How do you know?” Lucretia asked. Barry hummed on Lup’s other side but Lucretia couldn’t be sure if it was in agreement with her or just a general noise of announcing that he was still there.

“Because I have to,” Lup said, “because of all the places we have already been to. Some of them are still out there.”

“I carry them all with me,” Lucretia said, thinking of her notebooks, stashed away in a heavy chest on the ship.

“I guess we have nothing else but hope… and history,” Barry said solemnly.

“Oh my god, you’re such nerds,” Lup grinned, elbowing them both in the sides. Lucretia winced.

Barry laughed, but did sound suspiciously like he had the breath knocked out of him. “You’re also a nerd,” he said softly.

“True,” Lup mumbled. “Now look at the stars with me and stop thinking about the impending apocalypse for a second, we have new constellations to name.”

Lucretia met Barry’s eyes and smiled at him.

They spent the evening tracing the lines between stars in the sky and naming them increasingly outrageous things, until they grew tired and somber – even Lup.

“Look at those seven stars,” she said after she had been silent for almost a complete minute. “They almost form a perfect circle.”

“It’s us… it’s our group,” Barry mumbled.

Lucretia’s heart grew heavy and her eyes swept the night sky in search of something to distract her.

“Look,” he said, almost forgetting to breathe with how fast she was trying to get the words out before she lost her momentum – and her courage, “there’s a triangle next to it.”

“Now that’s _us_ ,” Lup said proudly.

Lucretia looked from the stars she had pointed out up at Lup, although she couldn’t see much of her apart from her cheek and nose and the glint of her eye.

“It’s beautiful,” Barry said.

“We’re so sappy,” Lup said and Lucretia could both see and hear the grin in her voice and on her face.

She scooted up a little, brushing her lips against Lup’s jaw. “I know, that’s why we make such a good relationship.”

“That’s gay,” Lup said deadpan and Barry snorted.

Lucretia rolled her eyes and withdrew a little. “Really?” she asked.

“Aw, babe,” Lup said, this time sounding sincere, “you know I love you and your sappiness.”

Lucretia willed herself not to be offended. She knew how Lup functioned – on bravado and spite and jokes – and that the emotion came second. It was always there, however, under the surface, making Lup the beautiful person that she was.

“We should probably go back,” Barry said.

Lucretia agreed with him. It was getting late, and while there were no predators on this world, the others would start worrying. “You’re right.”

“You are way too responsible,” Lup complained but followed suit anyway when they got up.

They walked back to camp hand in hand.

 

**Author's Note:**

> let me know what you thought about these good good kids. comments fuel me.
> 
> come visit me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/luffylaws) and [tumblr](https://leiathelight.tumblr.com)


End file.
